SteveJRogers Posted November 29, 2015 Report Share Posted November 29, 2015 What if, instead of announcing The Undertaker, DiBiase instead brought out, from Houston Texas...Mean Mark! And he comes out as, probably a gimmick hybrid of Taker's post BikerTaker through today/Biker Taker, with none of the "mystic, wrestling no selling zombie" traits of The Deadman through the years. Does he stay hot enough to be a Hogan challenger a year later? And does he stay hot enough to still be with the company all those years later, through the New Gen, Attitude, Brand Split and beyond? Or, despite his "locker room leader" status, does he move on at some point (be it WCW or ECW in the 1990s or TNA, ROH, or somewhere in the 2000s, based on no "special value" beyond the usual big name status. that he is bringing to the roster? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Timbo Slice Posted November 29, 2015 Report Share Posted November 29, 2015 No chance. Mean Mark had no juice at all. His ability to get something over notwithstanding, generic badass wouldn't have worked. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DMJ Posted November 30, 2015 Report Share Posted November 30, 2015 I'm probably a bigger Taken fan than most on here, but people are kidding themselves if they think his gimmick wasn't the biggest factor in his success and longevity. One could probably name a dozen guys who came in with similar "No Nonsense Bad Ass" gimmicks and didn't last 25 weeks, let alone 25 years. Speaking of which, anyone else remember when they brought back Chuck Palumbo in the very gimmick described in the OP? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
goc Posted November 30, 2015 Report Share Posted November 30, 2015 I'm probably a bigger Taken fan than most on here, but people are kidding themselves if they think his gimmick wasn't the biggest factor in his success and longevity. One could probably name a dozen guys who came in with similar "No Nonsense Bad Ass" gimmicks and didn't last 25 weeks, let alone 25 years. Speaking of which, anyone else remember when they brought back Chuck Palumbo in the very gimmick described in the OP? Yes, I thought they really dropped the ball on Palumbo in that run as I actually liked the feud with Jamie Noble. I agree with what he said about it in interviews though, eventually he needed to just kill Jamie Noble dead but apparently that wasn't where they wanted to go with it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SteveJRogers Posted November 30, 2015 Author Report Share Posted November 30, 2015 Yeah, I don't think he lasts too much longer than, say a year, in the mid-card. I'd have to check Cawthon's site, but I'd imagine the random non-PPV/SNME opponent challenger for the face champion for the house card circuit was winding down, and at the time Calaway wasn't the mold of the IC contenders. Thought maybe a 'Taker mark would somehow say that he'd have a spark of charisma to get over without needing a gimmick change. But I agree, while say a Curt Hennig or Ted DiBiase would have gotten over without their iconic character names, though Hennig's seemed to be more in the vein of say "you need a name for us to market" as it is today with NXT names as characters for real-ish personas, as opposed to Million Dollar Man being a character Ted DiBiase was portraying; Calaway probably would have needed a major gimmick refresh every now and then. Hell, his gimmick itself got refreshed a few times over the 25 years, and I'm not referring to the costume changes! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Slasher Posted November 30, 2015 Report Share Posted November 30, 2015 Part of the aura of the deadman gimmick is that he could get away with no selling to the length that he would never been able to get away with doing while doing the Mean Mark gimmick, so no the impact would have been nowhere close to what it was. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thebrainfollower Posted November 30, 2015 Report Share Posted November 30, 2015 Nope. Leaves the sport in a few years at most. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pantherwagner Posted November 30, 2015 Report Share Posted November 30, 2015 I don't know if he leaves the sport in a few years. He was a tall scary looking dude in the 90s. He'd have been repackaged to death (I only noticed the bad pun while spell checking), maybe bounced back and forth a couple of times and stayed around the major league scene for a while. Mabel, The Godfather and the Harris Twins were around seemingly forever and didn't have 1/10th of the potential and athleticism of Mean Mark. I realise a lot of the slow, non-action, deliberate style of Undertaker was by design but no way he'd have been a main eventer unless he'd upped his game earlier. Otherwise his best chance would have been a single shot main event vs. Diesel or Lex Luger. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Loss Posted December 13, 2015 Report Share Posted December 13, 2015 Here's something I'd love to get a timeline on. At what point was it that Vince really fell in love with Mark Calloway and the Undertaker gimmick beyond just how he liked someone like Razor Ramon or whoever? Was there a turning point, I wonder? The easy answer is that Undertaker stuck around when so many of his top stars left for WCW, but it seems like he already saw him as special long before that. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
flyonthewall2983 Posted December 13, 2015 Report Share Posted December 13, 2015 It must not have taken long. That long hiatus in 1994 did the company no favors as far as drawing power. And when he came back he was almost more of a featured attraction than he was before. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pantherwagner Posted December 13, 2015 Report Share Posted December 13, 2015 Here's something I'd love to get a timeline on. At what point was it that Vince really fell in love with Mark Calloway and the Undertaker gimmick beyond just how he liked someone like Razor Ramon or whoever? Was there a turning point, I wonder? The easy answer is that Undertaker stuck around when so many of his top stars left for WCW, but it seems like he already saw him as special long before that. Isn't it one of those gimmicks that Vince saw as his brainchild and loved from day one? Sort of like The Million Dollar Man? I have never though much about it but I have always assumed that he loved the Undertaker from the day he debuted. As for Calaway the performer, I also suppose he fell in love at some point in 1994. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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